Blame It On The Chocolate Factory

Fellow blogger and December SNG player WillWonka stopped by and left a comment two days ago. Immediately after rec. said comment my SNG game went in the toilet.

Coincidence... I think not.

Wonka managed to send his Bad SNG mojo my way and I now have experienced an abnormal amount of 3rd, 4th, and 5th place finishes. I also expect him to post about how spectacularly well he has been performing over the past few days since transferring his hex to me.

I present the following graph of my last 30 finishes as proof positive.

(The preceding post has of course been in jest, I don't really blame Wonka for my downswing... or do I?)

Snap Back To Reality

I'm going to chock it up to a combination of variance and bad calls but I crashed on the SNG front yesterday. Not the worst day I've ever had but I struggled constantly. Only one win on the day and a few thirds couldn't make up for all the losses. My ROI has now dropped down to 9%. I should be shooting for between 10-15% so I was running hot anyway.

I'll fire out some more today so I can stay on pace for the Gold Level Ironman. I might even throw in a MTT or two and mix things up.

SNG Good

It's been a little while since I last posted. I hope everyone had a joyous holidays. It was nice to kick back and relax with the family as we were relative free this holiday season. The whole family is now down with a cold but hey, at least were in it together.

I've continued to play the SNG's but I decided to try out the $20's because I wanted to clear my 100 Full Tilt Points each day in fewer tournaments. I've found the $20's to be a bit softer than the $10's which is a little surprising. I even managed to make it onto the Low Limit SNG Leaderboard before Christmas. I didn't play for two days and that was enough to bump me off but I should be back on the Board by the end of the month.

I also was gifted with $10 yesterday during the 12 Days of Christmas promo. Free money is always nice.

Anyway... Onto the new numbers

Stats:
Ran: 78
ROI: 19.6%
ITM: 37.2%
Profit: $336

My ITM has stayed pretty steady throughout.


I'm still managing to win a majority of the tournaments I make the money in. That makes for a nice looking graph.

True Dat

I stuck to my word for once and played no cash games. Played a few MTT's but nothing dramatic. The only one I managed to cash in was the Gold Freeroll. It wasn't for much money but it was nice to cash.

Based on my current bankroll I settled into the $10 SNG's. I haven't played any for a while and it took some time to adjust to the play. The players (in general) are better in the early stages than I remember. Fortunately there is still weakness in the end game.

I want to continue to qualify for the Gold Freeroll this month so I have to pay at least $15 in tournament fees a day. That means 15 SNG's per day and I'm playing 4 at a time. That usually means I have to play for at least 3 hours a day. This hasn't been to difficult to attain but the final set does feel like a grind.

I played 113 SNG's this last week and at one point I went 14 consecutive without cashing. That was harsh but I always felt I'd fight back.

Stats:
Ran: 113
ROI: 5%
ITM: 36.3%
Profit: $62

Here's a graph of my ROI. You'll see that I struggled to stay even in the beginning, hit my bad run, and since have steadily built up.

And here is the finish distribution. I'm very pleased with my ability to seal the deal when I get heads up. I really feel that I have improved in this area. When I ran SNG's before I had a higher ITM% but I wasn't winning as often.

Wits...Meet End

The frustration level has reached a peak never before seen during my 3 years of play. The rate at which my bankroll is being decreased is beyond anything I could comprehend.

Look up "lost" in a dictionary, and there I am.

Mike Matasow has his blow ups in tournaments, I'm having them in cash games. I'll grind and grind and grind then make a stupid move for my entire stack. It's like I can't help myself.

Looking at the numbers for the year so far they show that I'm a cash game loser. It's not a huge number, It's at right about $1,100 for the year and that is at different levels. In fact I'm only profitable at the 100NL tables. Everything else, including limit games, I'm down.

My tournament cashes are what save me. I'm still up over last years profit, but only by a meager $100. I really thought I would at least double last years figure. I haven't played a tournament in a month and maybe that's what my problem is. I'm not getting any diversity, and I'm not playing my best game (MTT's).

Maybe I shouldn't be playing cash games at all. The numbers say that MTT's are my best game. They were last year, and they are this year. I've always wanted to build up to being a high(ish) stakes cash game specialist.

Perhaps I just don't have the skill set for it.

Damn it's difficult to admit that.

Could be for the best though.

At any rate the cash games are going out of play for a while. I'm going to start getting into the SNG's again and the MTT's. If I continue to lose, then I'll probably take the rest of the month off.

I just don't know, it's kinda depressing.